The largest one YouTube published for that video. It asks for the 1280 by 720 file first, then 640 by 480, then 480 by 360, and shows you the first that exists. The two smaller sizes are 4:3, so a widescreen video has black bars in them, which are in YouTube’s own file.

Does it call your API?

No. A thumbnail’s address follows from the video’s id, so this page builds it in your browser and fetches it from YouTube. No lookup runs, and no credits or hourly allowance are used.

Does it work on Shorts, live streams and private videos?

Shorts and live links work the same way. A private or deleted video usually has no thumbnail left to fetch, and the page says so rather than handing you YouTube’s grey placeholder.

Save only thumbnails you made or have permission to use. That a file is public does not make it free to reuse, and posting someone else’s work as your own can infringe their copyright and YouTube’s terms.

How do I do this in code?

If you only want the image, build the address the same way: i.ytimg.com/vi/VIDEO_ID/maxresdefault.jpg. For the title, counts and thumbnail together, GET /v1/youtube/video takes a link at 1 credit.

YouTube thumbnail downloader

Paste a YouTube link and save the video’s thumbnail to your device, in the largest size YouTube published. It needs no account and makes no API call: the image comes from YouTube to you.

How to save a thumbnail

Copy the link: on YouTube tap Share, then Copy link, or copy the address from your browser.
Paste it in the box above and press Get thumbnail.
Check the preview, then press Download thumbnail to keep the file.

The file comes from YouTube’s servers straight to your device, so it uses your connection, not ours.

How this works

Paste a link to a public YouTube video or Short. We read the video’s id from the link and build the address of its thumbnail, with no lookup at all. Your browser asks YouTube for the largest size and falls back to a smaller one if that size does not exist, so the file never passes through our server, and you get a preview and a button that saves it.

Questions

Which size do I get?: The largest one YouTube published for that video. It asks for the 1280 by 720 file first, then 640 by 480, then 480 by 360, and shows you the first that exists. The two smaller sizes are 4:3, so a widescreen video has black bars in them, which are in YouTube’s own file.
Does it call your API?: No. A thumbnail’s address follows from the video’s id, so this page builds it in your browser and fetches it from YouTube. No lookup runs, and no credits or hourly allowance are used.
Does it work on Shorts, live streams and private videos?: Shorts and live links work the same way. A private or deleted video usually has no thumbnail left to fetch, and the page says so rather than handing you YouTube’s grey placeholder.
Is it allowed?: Save only thumbnails you made or have permission to use. That a file is public does not make it free to reuse, and posting someone else’s work as your own can infringe their copyright and YouTube’s terms.
How do I do this in code?: If you only want the image, build the address the same way: i.ytimg.com/vi/VIDEO_ID/maxresdefault.jpg. For the title, counts and thumbnail together, GET /v1/youtube/video takes a link at 1 credit.

Other free tools

All free tools

Read the guide

How Do You Download a YouTube, Instagram or TikTok Thumbnail?Paste the link and save the cover image, on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, X, Facebook or Dailymotion. YouTube needs no lookup at all. What size you get on each, and why some have black bars.